


Rescue You

by fangirl_outlet_very_much_needed



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Angst, Canon Compliant, Episode IX, F/M, Force Bond (Star Wars), Kylo Ren Redemption, Post-Canon, Post-TLJ, Star Wars: The Last Jedi Spoilers, epIX, hopefully a bit of fluff kind of
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-04-06
Updated: 2018-05-04
Packaged: 2019-04-19 08:30:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,524
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14233317
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fangirl_outlet_very_much_needed/pseuds/fangirl_outlet_very_much_needed
Summary: Months after the events of TLJ, a traumatic shift in power throws everything out of order for Kylo Ren and Rey. So much has changed -- the people they care about, the sides they fight for, and maybe even their relationship.***Author Note: This fic is written as closely to what I imagine could realistically happen in EPIX. It's not a prediction in any way, but tries to stay close to cannon.





	1. Rey

**Author's Note:**

> Hello all, 
> 
> Thanks for picking this to read! This is my first fic on AO3, so feedback is much appreciated. 
> 
> All the thanks in the world to @ever_so_reylo who beta-ed this piece. Def check out the fics on that account -- they're amazing!!
> 
> If you ever want to read more, especially the short ficlettes I write, head on over to my tumblr: fangirl-outlet-very-much-needed

Kylo was always there. Always a presence. Always a feeling. Something that merged into Rey’s own consciousness – distinct yet inherently intertwined.

Snoke was dead but the connection remained. The bond could not be severed like the master who claimed its conception. Either that meant he created something that even  _ he  _ couldn’t control, or he lied and manipulated  _ something else _ .

 

It took a while for them to master this strange connection forged between them. Rey learned first. The moment she closed the door of the Falcon, leaving him kneeling in his regret, she knew she could summon the focus to gain a margin of control. Kylo learned fast. The first time she ventured to clear the air, to regain the comfort they once had – he shut her out.

 

Learning to avoid the connections in the first place was another thing entirely. There were the painful moments of confrontation that sparked and flared in those first few meetings after Crait. In their wake came healing, but the kind where the wound is still smarting and raw, barely held together.

 

So they fell into awkward silences, until one of them gave in and closed the connection. Eventually, they were connected less and less. Maybe the Force felt it was getting nowhere. Maybe they were getting better at controlling their subconscious calls to each other.

 

_ Ben. Rey. _

 

But he was always there. A pressure at the base of her skull. A feeling that she couldn’t see but constantly sense.

And that’s how Rey would go about her day. With the weight of Ben Solo _literally_ in the back of her mind, praying he wouldn’t take up the rest of it either.  She had no time to idly miss him.

 

Leia’s death made it easier. Easier to forget him during the day. Easier to control their bond. It was the first time they both opened and closed it willingly. The Supreme Leader kneeling before the girl from nowhere, his face buried in the soft folds of her robes. Both of them crying tears – hers silent, his accompanied by  _ why, how, no.  _ A moment that they had an unspoken agreement to never bring up again.

 

Since then, Ben –  _ Kylo?  _ – was much easier to manage. The force hardly connected them anymore. She could still feel his boredom, his spikes of his rage, his spirals of loneliness – although to be fair, it was hard to distinguish that particular emotion from her own.

 

Until today.

 

She woke up – alarm blaring, of course – as the entire base was scrambling around her. Another semi-routine base scatter. As she rubbed the sleep from her eyes, she regretted telling Poe to keep her from the need-to-know list for moving days. It wasn’t like the bond mattered anymore anyway.

 

But then she felt the first tinge of cold run through her limbs.  _ Was that her? _

 

She carried on with her day. Checking flight coordinates and packing rations. Double checking fuel levels and finalizing repairs. But the coldness only grew heavier in her limbs.

 

And the paranoia grew. She snapped at mechanics who knows how many times. She jumped every time Finn, Poe, or Rose even came near her. The hairs on her arms were constantly on end. She felt herself looking over her shoulder every five minutes, and instinctively reaching for her saber on sudden impulses.

 

“Okay, Rey,” Finn finally cornered her on the Falcon, “What is going on?”

 

“I don’t know,” she admitted wearily, as a wave of nausea hit her out of nowhere, “But it’s getting worse.”

 

“Is it you? Or is  _ he  _ doing this to you?” Finn narrowed his eyes, while propping a swooning Rey against his frame.

 

“I think it’s him,” Rey heard herself whimper, “It’s normally not this bad.”

 

“I’d say ignore it, but it doesn’t look like you can,” Finn rolled his eyes, “It just sucks that you get sick whenever he feels like he has to throw a temper tantrum.”

 

“No, you’re right,” Rey set her jaw, “He picked this life. If the Supreme Leader is having a rough day, he can deal with it.”

 

And with that, she dug deep and focused on shoving Ben’s feelings out of her body. Her mind pressed against every frayed nerve that sparked against her own. She buried them under a stoic pressure until there was only a dull throb instead of crashing waves. With a curt nod, she left with Finn to check in at the command center.

 

Poe was at the head of the table, surrounded by the hundred Resistance survivors and the few hundred more they had recruited to the Rebellion. The command center was not much more than a holographic table adjacent to the hanger that was filled with an assortment of star fighters, a meticulously gathered collection that was Leia’s last gift to the Rebellion.

 

Rey stood to his left, watching the coordinates of their next base blink in a steady rhythm. The smooth command of Poe’s voice was slowly fading against growing roar in her ears. It was incessant. It was nauseating. It was –--

 

Gone.

 

Rey collapsed against the table, unceremoniously disrupting the holo projection. Her limbs too weak, she slipped and crashed into the dirt floor. Her chest heaved as the of her body sank further into the ground.

 

Poe, Finn, and Rose were beside her in seconds. Rose brushed back hair from Rey’s clammy forehead. Finn checked her pulse, and tried to gauge if her pupils were dilated. Poe hovered above, calling her name, but it sounded waterlogged and distant.

 

“Something’s wrong,” Rey managed, “Ben.”

 

Rose reacted first while Finn and Poe stared in shock. “We have to get her out of here!” she hissed to the boys. Rey was dangerously close to revealing her most heavily guarded secret -- the one she only shared with Finn, Poe, and Rose after Leia...  

 

Finn scooped her up into his arms. Rey’s head curled against him, as she mumbled incoherently against his chest. Poe lead the way, clearing a path of awed onlookers, as the three of them sped to his office.

 

It took another ten minutes for Rey to physically get over the shock. She leaned her head on Rose’s shoulder, taking deep breaths. The feeling returned to her limbs, but they were as heavy as lead, her chest hollow.

 

“So what the hell just happened back there?” Poe asked, running a hand through his hair.

 

“Kylo,” Finn gritted out.

 

“Something’s wrong,” Rey repeated.

 

“Well, isn’t that a good thing?” Finn asked, “Whatever is wrong for the First Order has to be good for us!”

 

“No, no,” Rey shook her head, “Something’s wrong with  _ him.  _ I can’t – I can’t feel him anymore.”

 

_ You can’t leave me all alone Ben. Where are you _ ?

 

“Is this like your Force Bond thing?” Rose asked gently, somehow finding just the right words to describe what Rey had explained to the three of them so  many months ago.

 

Rey nodded miserably.

 

“He’s gone,” she said, “I don’t feel anything. At all. Not from the bond. Not from the Force. It’s like he was just erased entirely. And I hate it. I hate not knowing.”

 

“I don’t understand,” Finn said, exasperated and worried, “I thought this is what you wanted. I thought you hated that monster.”

 

“ _ Finn!” _  Rose shot at him, “Haven’t you been paying attention? She doesn’t hate Ben.”

 

“ _ Ben _ ,” Rey insisted, “I know something happened to him. He wouldn’t just disappear if it was nothing.”

 

“What do you want us to do about it Rey?”

 

There was nothing sarcastic or challenging in Poe’s voice. When she looked up she saw the determination in his jaw.  The glint of adventure and danger waging a battle in his eyes.

 

“Are you serious Poe?” Finn gasped, “You’re going to do something for our enemy. Someone who, may I remind you,  _ tortured  _ you for information.”

 

“This is Leia’s son, Finn,” Poe said, “Do you seriously expect me to just disrespect her like that? After everything?”

 

“But –“

 

“Besides,” Poe talked over his best friend, “We’re not going for Kylo Ren. We’re going for Ben Solo.”

 

Rey smiled lightly. She remembered how she finally opened up to the resistance pilot after he found her curled up in the corner of the Falcon, chugging a bottle of [ Knockback Nectar](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Knockback_Nectar) Unkar Plutt stored in bunches. It was before she and Ben had their bond under control, and he had stormed away after a particularly painful argument about who deserted who up in the stars on the Supremacy.  Poe peeled her off the wall and let her sob into his shirt, soaking it in booze and boogers for a good half and hour. Then he left her talk his hear off, til their asses grew numb on the cold steel floor, about the bond and about Ben and about how damn frustrating it all was.

 

Then Poe took a long swig from her bottle, bracing from the taste. He told her about this kid he once knew – smart, snarky, serious – from his time growing up around Leia. They were a few years apart, but both basically lived in the hangar with Poe’s mom and Han. Solo. Poe always called him by his last name. The kid was a dead set on being a hotshot pilot, but had a temper that matched his mother and father.

Poe found him one day kicking part of his speeder after it refused to cooperate with the rest of the machinery.  The other kids his age kept their distance – he was the son of two famous generals (one a senator and the other a kick ass pilot) and had the same unanswerable powers as his mystic uncle. But Poe just saw a pissed off awkward kid, who couldn’t figure out how to make his speeder go faster. So he showed him. Then he raced him.  Then they flew combat drills in the sky while their parents were stuck in meetings.

 

But then Poe moved away with his mother. And he heard Ben went across the stars with his uncle – learning about those weird powers that Poe still couldn’t really process. And one day they met up again, in the sands of Jakku. Then Poe was restrained in a chair while Ben, cloaked in darkness and wearing a mask that his co-pilot could see through any day, roughly ripped through Poe’s memories.

 

So yes, Rey knew Poe was not about to let a chance to rescue Ben Solo go by. And that’s how she found herself on the Falcon, not even an hour later, leading a squadron of star fighters through light years into the heart of the First Order.

 

_ If you can hear me Ben, we’re coming for you. _


	2. Kylo

Somewhere in the bowels of a soulless spaceship, Kylo Ren sagged against a wall. His massive frame curled in on itself inside the tiny cell he found himself caught in. He writhed against the starchy white fabric that either scratched at his skin or soaked up his own blood. The four traitorous guards of his who shoved him in there stood outside, glowing, hissing weapons at the ready. Ready to cut out his heart….as if it was wasn’t already.

How could he have let this happen? He was smarter than this. His mother was a senator and a princess. His grandmother was a senator and a queen. He was the leader of nearly the entire galaxy, and he was outwitted by a pasty, snivelly, militant general.

Yes, Hux had been his most prominent rival since before Kylo stole the throne. So he had been keeping an eye on him. Padmé lost her Republic to the chancellor she put into power. Leia was ousted by a friend she trusted too much. He wouldn’t make the same mistake with the First Order. So Kylo watched Hux -- his every move, his every sneer of contempt, his every subversive order.

Yet, he missed something.

Kylo was too blinded by sentiment. His mother’s violent passing sent a tsunami through the force. He felt himself drowning in that aftermath, tethered to the weight of his guilt, playing the moment over and over as he imagined it from the reports. Did his orders truly lead to her….could he have been so misguided to think he could crush rebellions and establish order while sparing his mother and Rey?

As Kylo wallowed in his darkened chambers, or stared into the stars from his suffocating throne room, he missed the rumors of tyranny, of treason sparking across the Supremacy. He mistook the way his new trained guards, his personal knights, grew more cautious and observant around him as respect. He misread the deadened silence of the crew, the troops, the generals as fear.   

It wasn’t until his knights trapped him in the throne room, his head forced back and a knife guarding his jugular, that everything fell into place. The First Order troops all trained their weapons on him. The miraculously revived Phasma stripped him of his saber, and roughly restrained him in Force-dampening cuffs. 

And Hux.

Hux smirked as he strode up the throne room corridor. The heels of his meticulously shined boots echoed against the lofted ceiling. Without hesitation he threw his hand across Kylo Ren’s face, staining his cheek pink and drawing blood.

“Kylo Ren,” Hux announced, with his chest puffed out, “You have done nothing to prove your leadership besides upend First Order practices and bend them as you see fit. You subverted First Order attempts to finally crush the rebellion time and time again; to the point of essentially aiding the rebel scum.

But most heinously of all, you stand accused of treason and usurpation of the First Order leadership.  You conspired with an enemy to slay Supreme Leader Snoke, along with six of his loyal guards. After reviewing considerable evidence against you, including incontrovertible video proof of you in Supreme Leader Snoke’s elevator with that dessert bitch.We find you guilty.”

The journey to his cell was not a short one.

Kylo was sent through the troops first. Shoved into the center of a mosh pit; he was punched, kicked, slashed, tripped. His cloak was ripped from him. His tunic was slashed in the back. He emerged on the other side, face first at Hux’s feet. The man circled him slowly. Kylo dragged himself up to his knees, as Hux stopped to face him again. The last thing Kylo saw before doubling over was Hux’s face twisted into a wolfish grin as he sunk his knee into Kylo’s diaphragm.

‘Take this pathetic show of nothing away,” Hux commanded.

Kylo was roughly pulled to his feet by one of his knights. In a surge of desperation, he struggled. Kylo ripped his arms free and slammed them into his betrayer’s head. The knight crumpled, but three more surged forward. Each threw their sizzling weapons – crude plasma staffs – into his shoulders, his back, his gut. Kylo heard his scream through a fog, as if it was coming from some other poor beast, but not him. His vision blurred, spotted, and tinged red. The sparks continued their numbing dance across his skin as he fell, defeated, to his knees once more.

His knights – former brothers in arms – dragged him against the gleaming cobalt floors. They took the long way to the brig, taking great care to display his broken will to every soldier and officer that had yet to hear the news: Kylo Ren was Supreme Leader no longer.

It wasn’t until he was thrown, quite literally, against the back wall of his cell what had just transpired. He was defeated. Outmaneuvered. Out fought. He was no master of the force, no Luke or Snoke. He was no conqueror, no Vader. He was no leader, no Padmé. He was no survivor, no Han. He was no fighter, no Leia.

He was nothing.

He came from everything.

He was nothing.

Kylo, feeling smaller than he had in years, let the pain wash over him. The stinging that still buried into his wounds. The headache that pounded against his skull. The aches that weighed down his limbs. The waves that crashed into him with nausea.  The burning that seared him with guilt, with shame, with rage, with anguish, with fear. He let it all wash over him. Drowning in his churning emotions, he didn’t even realize that the bond was left open. That everything was spilling into and rushing through that thin thread that fed into her – Rey.

Through the din of self-admonishment that was playing on a loop inside his mind Kylo heard her. She was whimpering in pain – her frustration, confusion, and helplessness colliding into his own. He was hurting her. Keeping the bond open was dragging her down into his own hell. If he couldn’t save himself, he could at least save her.

So he shut himself off.

His pain ricocheted off the mental seals, but they held fast. Kylo was alone – with his thoughts, with his pain, with his countdown to execution no doubt.  But he could imagine her, smiling up at Chewie in the Falcon, feeling weightless with their severed connection as he sank deeper and deeper into his personal black hole.

Hux appeared at the door of Kylo’s cell, “I told you not to let your personal feelings get in the way, Ren.”

Kylo couldn’t even lift his eyes to see the smirk that lingered on Hux’s face. Not that he needed to, the air of sadistic satisfaction was basically suffocating in the small space. No doubt the general enjoyed seeing Kylo like this, caught, cramped, and crushed.

“Although I guess I should thank you,” Hux continued, “I saw you trembling in front of that, t _ hat girl _ , and it set up everything so nicely for me. I knew that would seal your fate, I just had to figure out how to let it spread to the troops without you knowing.”

Kylo’s head dipped lower, but Hux wasn’t finished.

“If I had known that all it would take to knock you off the chessboard was killing your mother, and staging the blame on you, I would have done it sooner. She called for you, by the way, in the end. Your name was on her lips.”

 

Kylo growled low in his chest. 

 

“For her insufferable, archaic ideas of freedom, she was shrewd,” Hux picked absentmindedly at his glove, “She knew it wasn’t really your orders that had her ship raided. She was effectively useless for information if that gives you any comfort -- beyond testing our new equipment. But I still enjoyed the way she screamed in the torture lab...although, she didn’t last long – old age makes one weak.”

Kylo launched at him. A surge of white hot vengeance propelled him from the wall and directly against the bars of his cell. He rammed them hard enough to shake the door, and send Hux skittering back a few feet. Kylo seethed at the pitiful slight of a man before him, his dark locks framing his vision, cutting across Hux’s body is several lethal areas.

Hux took a deep breath once he realized that the cell was holding fast. Leering into Kylo’s face, the general sneered.

“Now, now Ren. Don’t get yourself into anymore trouble. Your friends here have no qualms about beating you within an inch of your miserable life.”

“Why don’t you just kill me now,” Kylo hissed, “Less of a chance I get out of here and crush your windpipe with my bare hands.”

“Tempting, Ren. Very tempting. But see, you being marginally functional, or at least breathing, is the last part of my plan to secure the First Order’s prosperity.”

“What are you talking about?” Kylo growled.

“That video of you and that girl was very enlightening,” Hux smiled as Kylo squirmed with discomfort,  “It was obvious that you were clearly out of your league -- your pathetic show of sentiment embarrassingly evident. However, behind your obtuse display of adoration, I noticed she was just as deeply wrapped in whatever qualities she deemed you possessed.”

“You will never get your hands on her.”

Hux released a cold laugh, “Oh, but see, I will. Because of you. When your plight is broadcast all over the galaxy, she’ll come running to save you. That’s what those annoying self-righteous rebels do. And she’ll bring the entire rebel fleet crashing down with her.”

Kylo sagged against the cell door. A hurricane of emotion swirling inside him. He prayed nothing slipped through the bond. That Rey would continue being free of him and fly far, far away.

Hux leaned in for the kill, “But don’t worry Ren. You’ll get to see her again. She’s worth nothing after the rebellion falls – except to you. So I’ll make her death worthwhile, before your very public execution.”

Kylo didn’t bother getting up. He just glared from behind his curtain of dark locks, his dark eyes stormy but set.

“I am going to kill you.”

As Hux retreated and the guards resumed their posts, Kylo found himself still optionless in the cell, stranded. He entreated a desperate plea into the deafening silence inside his mind.

_ Rey, if you can hear this. Save the galaxy. Save yourself. _


End file.
